On route to Melbourne from Sydney we came across a wonderful salad. It was dense, full of healthy greens, grains and protein and was really satisfying. So as we arrived in Melbourne we decide to re-create it. Expect a mouthful of this on salad nights on our retreats.

The kale an goji salad we’ve made here is served with sesame vinaigrette courgette ribbons, basil, tomatoes and our friend’s – Phil and Liz – yummy home-made bread. For extra flavour and our dose of B12 we’ll be having ours with nutritional yeast massaged into the kale next time.

Prep time – 40 minutes (for cooking the pearl barley)
Cooling time – 1 hour in fridge

Ingredients
1/2 cup dried pearl barley
1/2 cup dried brown lentils
water for cooking
1/2 cup pumpkin seeds
1/2 cup sunflower seeds
1/2 cup dried goji berries
4 good sized fresh kale leaves
1 tomato cubed
1/4 cucumber cubed
4 good stems of dill finely chopped
1 lemon
1 tbsp honey
2 tbsp tamari
sea salt
black pepper

Method
1. Juice the lemon. Keep the skin of the lemon and set the juice to one side.

2. Boil your pearl barley in 1.5 cups water for 30 minutes. Once cooked, drain and let sit in the steaming pan with the lid on to fluff without drowning.

3. Boil your lentils in 1.5 cups lightly salted water for 20 minutes with the lemon peel in the pan. Once cooked, drain and leave to soften further in the pan with the lid on.

4. Whilst your barley and lentils are boiling, soak/marinate the pumpkin seeds, and sunflower seeds  in a bowl with the honey, lemon juice, tamari and some freshly cracked black pepper.

5. Wash and massage the kale thoroughly and firmly until the colour darkens and the leave and stems become softer. Scrunch the kale together firmly and slice into very slim shards. Finely slice any thick stems but don’t discard them as they add lovely crunch.

6. Once all of the ingredients are cooked, chopped and prepped, combine them and roll together until all the goodness is equally distributed.

7. Chill in the fridge in an open container for an hour and roll before serving.

Enjoy.